i know it’s been almost a month…actually it’s probably BEEN a month and a bit but i refuse to calculate!!! hehe
alright … moving along!
the trip to cambodia featured a 13+ hour bus-ride from ho chi minh city – due to our newbness in planning our trip..we had conceived that it wasn’t possible to take a bus from hanoi to siem reap (it actually was) so we bought plane tickets cheap from jetstar to ho chi minh city and from there we crossed our fingers that we would be able to get a bus out to cambodia. thankfully, it proved to be quite easy to do so…there were numerous travel agencies just outside of our hostel in ho chi minh and we eventually just bought tickets off our hostel owner who coordinated the whole shindig for us (and thankfully did a pretty good job).
so the bus was set to depart at 830 and as a result…we set our alarms at 7 – set on getting up, having time to get ready, eat breakfast etc…BUT for some reason we all slept through our alarms…ended up getting up around 815 to the sounds of our worried hostel owner banging on our room door…BOOKED it like no other to the bus and feeling groggy/gross/nasty/tired/blah we set off for cambodia.
ended up crossing the border about 3 hours in and going through the cambodia border crossing was a lot less painful than the vietnam customs because our bus drivers just filled out all our forms super quick and processed the paperwork…it was PRETTY sweet.
first thing we did after crossing the border was eat at a sketchy joint a couple minutes past the border crossing. during travelling – it’s an interesting process to submit yourself to trusting in the good intentions of complete strangers – like our tourbus guides. we had to switch buses a couple times during the trip…when we finally made it to phnomh penh (which i really wished that we had had time to see because i’m reeally wanted to see the remnants of the pol pot regime but time was not on our side) we had to switch to another tour bus that was half-full that would bring us the rest of the way to siem reap.
cambodia is marvelous, the place has an inexplicable charm and magic to the land. something that simultaneously allures you…yet beckons you to approach with caution – the land is tainted with a terrible past yet the beauty in the cambodian people is everywhere to be seen.
anyways when we finally arrived in siem reap – mind you in a half-awake stupor…i was drifting in a current of sleep/being awake throughout the whole trip there…night had already fallen and to our surprise…vincent OF COURSE was a superstar and had secretly made plans with our hostel (the siem reap hostel) to send a taxi to the bus station and sure enough a taxi-driver waved us down upon our arrival and we were greeted with a cooler of angkor beer as we made our way to our resting place.
the siem reap hostel was definitely by far my favorite hostel for many reasons: 1) the owners made a concerted effort to ensure that the hostel was truly cambodian in that the construction company contracted was a local firm, the materials were all from the native land and lastly the vast majority of the staff were locals. 2) there was an indoor pool (which we didn’t end up using but meh schmeh still cool to see) 3) it was clean and the room was large compared to our hostel in ho chi minh 4) i’m biased because i was so enchanted by cambodia in general 
that first evening we befriended a girl travelling by herself from Britain who had arrived the night before…and headed to pub street – a mecca of tourists and travellers which seems to fuel the economy of the city for the most part -just a brief 10 minute walk away. i had my first and farrrr from last taste of cambodian amok that first night…along with fresh spring rolls – absolutely heavenly.
the next morning we met our tuktuk driver saron…he had a colorful yet tragic past…we would soon find out. nevertheless we headed straight to the temples on our tuktuk (a cart that can seat about 4 people…in cambodia and thailand pulled by a motorcycle).
incredible.
i’ll let the pictures do the talking because for the most part what we did at the temples was pay homage to the illustrious ruins that we were able to see. we avoided angkor wat the first day because we decided to come back early the next morning to watch the sunset but even visiting the other smaller temples and the temple where tomb raider was filmed….i was in awe. these ruins were firstly enormous..entire cities reduced to the city walls which remain in some cases remarkably in tact…you can’t help but marvel at the spectacular detailed carvings which line the walls through and through. it was alike nothing i’ve ever seen before and i developed a deep respect for the cambodian culture having the opportunity to walk through, to see and touch the past and imagine how grand the ruins must have been hundreds of years ago.
tbcontinued….
